Linux From Scratch - Version 7.4-rc1

Chapter 8. Making the LFS System Bootable

8.2. Creating
the /etc/fstab File

The /etc/fstab file is used by some
programs to determine where file systems are to be mounted by
default, in which order, and which must be checked (for integrity
errors) prior to mounting. Create a new file systems table like this:

Replace <xxx>,
<yyy>, and <fff> with the values
appropriate for the system, for example, sda2, sda5, and
ext4. For details on the six fields
in this file, see man 5
fstab.

Filesystems with MS-DOS or Windows origin (i.e.: vfat, ntfs, smbfs,
cifs, iso9660, udf) need the “iocharset” mount option in order for non-ASCII
characters in file names to be interpreted properly. The value of
this option should be the same as the character set of your locale,
adjusted in such a way that the kernel understands it. This works if
the relevant character set definition (found under File systems ->
Native Language Support) has been compiled into the kernel or built
as a module. The “codepage”
option is also needed for vfat and smbfs filesystems. It should be
set to the codepage number used under MS-DOS in your country. E.g.,
in order to mount USB flash drives, a ru_RU.KOI8-R user would need
the following in the options portion of its mount line in
/etc/fstab:

noauto,user,quiet,showexec,iocharset=koi8r,codepage=866

The corresponding options fragment for ru_RU.UTF-8 users is:

noauto,user,quiet,showexec,iocharset=utf8,codepage=866

Note

In the latter case, the kernel emits the following message:

FAT: utf8 is not a recommended IO charset for FAT filesystems,
filesystem will be case sensitive!

This negative recommendation should be ignored, since all other
values of the “iocharset”
option result in wrong display of filenames in UTF-8 locales.

It is also possible to specify default codepage and iocharset values
for some filesystems during kernel configuration. The relevant
parameters are named “Default NLS
Option” (CONFIG_NLS_DEFAULT), “Default Remote NLS Option” (CONFIG_SMB_NLS_DEFAULT), “Default codepage for FAT” (CONFIG_FAT_DEFAULT_CODEPAGE), and “Default iocharset for FAT” (CONFIG_FAT_DEFAULT_IOCHARSET). There is no way to
specify these settings for the ntfs filesystem at kernel compilation
time.

It is possible to make the ext3 filesystem reliable across power
failures for some hard disk types. To do this, add the barrier=1 mount option to the appropriate entry in
/etc/fstab. To check if the disk drive
supports this option, run hdparm
on the applicable disk drive. For example, if: